assertion made here that he was by no means a dealer in words. On
looking at the first feeble drafts from which so many perfect stories
have been fashioned, one discovers that what has been matured, improved,
brought to perfection by unwearied endeavour is not the diction of the
tale, but the vision of its true shape and detail. Those first attempts
are not faltering or uncertain in expression. It is the conception which
is at fault. The subjects have not yet been adequately seen. His
proceeding was not to group expressive words, that mean nothing, around
misty and mysterious shapes dear to muddled intellects and belonging
neither to earth nor to heaven. His vision by a more scrupulous,
prolonged and devoted attention to the aspects of the visible world
discovered at last the right words as if miraculously impressed for him
upon the face of things and events. This was the particular shape taken
by his inspiration; it came to him directly, honestly in the light of his
day, not on the tortuous, dark roads of meditation. His realities came
to him from a genuine source, from this universe of vain appearances
wherein we men have found everything to make us proud, sorry, exalted,
and humble.

Maupassant's renown is universal, but his popularity is restricted. It
is not difficult to perceive why. Maupassant is an intensely national
writer. He is so intensely national in his logic, in his clearness, in
his aesthetic and moral conceptions, that he has been accepted by his
countrymen without having had to pay the tribute of flattery either to
the nation as a whole, or to any class, sphere or division of the nation.
The truth of his art tells with an irresistible force; and he stands
excused from the duty of patriotic posturing. He is a Frenchman of
Frenchmen beyond question or cavil, and with that he is simple enough to
be universally comprehensible. What is wanting to his universal success
is the mediocrity of an obvious and appealing tenderness. He neglects to